Neighborhood Organizations

Williams's past experience as a community organizer for `havenots' is clearly apparent in this carefully researched book, as his conviction that neighborhood organizations can play a key role in revitalizing urban life. After examining the setting for neighborhood organizations and discussing how neighborhoods change, he delves into the internal dynamics of those organizations. Chapters are devoted to various problems that neighborhood organizations have defined, such as crime and education; a final section analyzes neighborhood groups as conflict managers and mediators. The book offers a good survey of literature on neighborhood organizations, both theoretical and applied, and provides readers a unique bibliography of selected materials, with brief comments about each major topic; each chapter also has extensive notes and bibliography. Both grass-roots organizers and professionals in social work and city management will find this book useful. Choice